There was no clear consensus among Federal Reserve officials at their Aug. 9 meeting about what the best next easing step would be, according to the minutes of the meeting released on Tuesday.
Options on the table included more asset purchases, increasing the maturity of the Fed's balance sheet or cutting the interest on excess reserves the Fed pays to banks.
After the discussion, the central bankers decided on a "measured" move - to change the language of the statement to indicate they thought their benchmark interest rate would stay near zero until mid-2013 and wait for lengthy discussion about easing at a two-day meeting next month.
Some on the FOMC wanted the statement to say that the FOMC would keep rates low until the unemployment rate fell to a specific target or setting an inflation target.
But other officials were concerned about how to pick a target.
The minutes show that the Fed officials did not see a recession coming but were worried that the economy was vulnerable to shocks.
The FOMC held an unscheduled meeting to discuss possible failure by Congress to raise the federal debt ceiling and what actions they could take if "disruptions to market functioning posed a threat to the Fed's economic objectives."
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